Title: That's Not...
Author: KouenTaisa/WonderTwinC (Ched)
Rating: T
Pairing: Beckett/Castle
Status: 1/1
Category/Warnings: Character Death
Spoilers: none really.
Summary: Esposito was positive that he had never heard his female partner sound so broken.
A/N: The third (I think) thing I ever wrote for the Castle fandom. My mind is all about the angst, so sorry about that. But someone was talking about how you could turn a lot of the Grey's quotes into stuff for other shows, and so I came up with this. There is a sort of sequel/prequel I'll be posting up so keep an eye open for that too. The conversation it mostly Izzie/Alex from the season finale of season two of Grey's, but it's been tweeked to fit.

"Can you please… can you please just get out? I want to be alone with Castle," her voice was barely above a whisper, but Esposito was positive that he had never heard his female partner sound so broken. Standing there with her in the hospital room was almost more than he could take, but he knew that leaving her alone wasn't the best of ideas. When they had been in the waiting room she had been a storm of emotions, but she had never tried to push any of them away.

Now, Ryan had left to make the needed calls and Esposito didn't have the heart to just walk away from her. "Beckett, that's not Castle," he stated quietly, not wanting to startle her into lashing out. The day had been long and he was exhausted, but he was nowhere near ready to give up on his partner just yet.

"Esposito-" her voice was firm, somewhat angry, and he knew that he had to take the opening he had, however small it was, and run with it.

"Kate, that's not Castle. The minute his heart stopped beating he stopped being Richard Castle. I know you love him, but he also loved you and I've gotta say that a guy that loves you like Castle did… he doesn't want you to do this to yourself."

The rational part of Kate's mind, the part that was barely functioning at the moment, knew that everything Esposito said was true. Castle wouldn't have wanted her to be so broken, but then again, he wasn't around this time to fix her.

"A few hours ago he was proposing and now… now he's going to the morgue." her voice managed to remain moderately strong until the end, even though Javier was certain that she was trembling as she stared down at the white sheet covering Castle's body.

He knew that she was remembering the moments leading up to this, because he was doing the same.

It was hard to believe that just a few hours ago he had been joking around with the novelist in the precinct while they all worked a case together. All four of them had been happy and carefree and unsuspecting. Beckett had been smiling and teasing the man that she loved and he had been doing the same to her in return. The same thing that had been doing for close to five years. Just a few short hours ago, Richard Castle had been alive and now… he was not.

"Isn't it ridiculous?" she asked so quietly that Esposito almost missed it entirely, but she didn't care. All she could think about was the ring in her pocket and the bullet hole in Castle's chest. Everything about the case had been so routine. Everything. Nothing had indicated that going to question the victim's daughter would end with her kneeling beside Castle on the ground as she tried to stop him from bleeding out with help from Esposito while Ryan cuffed the woman and took her away.

For a long moment, neither one of them said anything and the silence of before slowly crept back into place.